Not Applicable.
Not Applicable.
Not Applicable.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mobile cooling apparatus. In particular, the present invention relates to a mobile cooling apparatus that provides a large volume of previously cooled air containing a suspended mist for cooling objects and air in an unenclosed spaced. Known art may be found in U.S. Classes 62 and 261, subclasses 91, 239, 304, 309 and 29 as well as in other classes and subclasses.
2. Description of the Prior Art
As is well known and appreciated by those skilled in the art, water has a high heat of vaporization. This knowledge has been used in the past to cool air using evaporative coolers. The practice has been especially attractive when there is a large quantity of heat involved since it is relatively inexpensive compared to heat exchanging systems such as air conditioning. For situations where ventilation of enclosures is required to maintain the desired air quality, the expense of heat exchangers is usually prohibitively high. This knowledge has also been used to cool objects directly by moistening the outside of the object and allowing evaporation to occur.
The cooling properties of a moving air stream to man and animals are also well known. It has been shown that this cooling property is a result of heat being transported away from the skin more rapidly, i.e. wind chill factor. This process is even faster if the skin is moistened with water that absorbs the heat of vaporization prior to being removed from the skin as a vapor in the moving air stream. For animals that do not perspire, a layer of water to achieve this evaporative cooling must be applied by means other than sweating.
Preventing heat stress in livestock during hot weather is of paramount importance. Animals that get too hot can expire in a very short period of time. In an animals day-to-day activities various precautions are routinely taken to prevent heat stress, i.e. plenty of drinking water, shade, and in confinement areas fans, fixed evaporative coolers, or the like.
In animal production, the animals eventually need to be transported from their growing environment to another locale such as a marketing or processing facility. The transportation step requires that the animals be captured and loaded onto a transport conveyance, often one having special structures for restraining the animals during shipment, and subsequently shipped to the destination. Most modern commercial transport conveyances consist of specially constructed trailers that usually have multiple layers with several individual pens on each layer. Such trailers are typically well ventilated and thus provide adequate cooling when moving at normal highway speeds.
The trip to the destination thus usually provides sufficient cooling from the blowing wind to cool the animals. This is especially true of animals that perspire. However, cooling from blowing wind alone may be inadequate for non-perspirers with thick insulating layers such as hair or feathers if such have gotten too hot during the loading process.
For example, a particularly undesirable condition may easily arise with poultry. Poultry do not perspire and are covered with insulating feathers. When overheated, poultry pant with their mouths open to rapidly exchange air from their lungs. Their natural cooling ability is very poor since they have insulating feathers. Poultry generate heat at about one BTU per hour per pound of body weight. They generate even more heat when they are active, which is the case when they are loaded onto a truck. Although poultry are usually caught and loaded at night since they are less active in lowlight or dark environments, this is also usually a period of very low wind speeds so little cooling to the poultry sitting in cages on the truck will occur from natural winds.
It is obvious that there is a critical time between when the poultry begin to be loaded and the loading is complete when little cooling is occurring. Poultry that are placed in multiple layers of cages on a trailer without adequate ventilation can generate sufficient heat to cause severe heat stress that can lead to death if not timely alleviated. Often times in the past during hot weather, if the loading operation would have to be stopped, the partially loaded truck would have to be driven around to reduce heat stress and prevent death of the poultry.
Culled birds due to heat stress and death (sick or dead animals will not pass USDA inspection) may be quite expensive. Expense is also incurred when the partially loaded or loaded truck has to be driven to cool the birds. Naturally such situations are to be avoided when possible.
Attempts have been made to address cooling problems. Windecker (U.S. Pat. No. 4,598,555) discloses a gas cooler. The gas cooler is used to cool freshly harvested vegetation in refrigeration containers by circulating 25,000 cubic feet of chilled air per minute through the container. In one embodiment, the invention uses a large trailer that may be parked in an abutting end-to-end fashion with a vegetation-containing trailer. Conduits formed by pallets on which boxes of the vegetation are stacked distribute the chilled air, which flows through the produce to the top of the refrigerated container. Air is withdrawn from the top of the container and cooled by flowing it past large chilled water film surface area produced by cascading 2200 gallons of water per minute through a cross-fluted PVC surface media block. A drift eliminator removes water droplets that might damage vegetation or cardboard boxes from the chilled air exiting the surface media block. A radial fan re-circulates the re-chilled air to the conduits below the pallets. A false door is movably mounted to fluidly connect the airflow at appropriate positions in the container. This device is principally adapted for end placement abutting van trailers. It is not adapted for use with flatbed trailers and it is of only marginal relevance to the present invention.
Hearne, Jr. (U.S. Pat. No. 6,202,434 B1) discloses a portable combination hydro cooling and forced refrigerated air-cooling unit. The invention includes a portable cooling trailer for cooling produce at the harvest site, where the produce may be cooled by either forced air refrigeration, where cooled air is drawn through the produce and recycled through a heat exchanger, or hydro cooling, where chilled water is sprayed onto the produce, recaptured and recycled through the heat exchanger. This invention primarily concerns a refigerated trailer and it is of only marginal relevance to the present invention.
Ferdows (U.S. Pat. No. 4,835,982), Ferdows (U.S. Pat. No. 5,285,654), Anderson (U.S. Pat. No. 3,738,621), and Asbridge (U.S. Pat. No. 5,309,726) disclose various types of evaporative coolers. They are of marginal relevance to the present invention in that they deal with individual evaporative units and not a large mobile cooling system.
Van Huis (U.S. Pat. No. 3,965,691), Casey, Sr. (U.S. Pat. No. 5,692,386), Krevinghaus et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 5,492,082), Waldron (U.S. Pat. No. 5,778,687), and Shockley, Jr. (U.S. Pat. No. 3,900,006) disclose various types of cooling systems for poultry houses or the like. These references are of marginal relevance to the present invention in that they primarily relate to various types of fixed mounted systems for cooling poultry houses or the like.
Thus, a need exists for an improved mobile cooling apparatus such as a self-contained trailer or the like. Such a cooling trailer should be able to cool an area by blowing a cooling stream of misted air to control the local atmosphere surrounding the area. More particularly, such a trailer could be quickly deployed at a remote locale to cool an otherwise inaccessible area.
The present invention addresses the perceived needs in the art. A mobile cooling apparatus is provided that may be quickly deployed to cool an area. The apparatus is preferably self-contained or substantially self-contained. The apparatus can be either a dedicated trailer with a conventional draft vehicle or a vehicle itself.
In accordance with one exemplary embodiment of the present invention, a mobile cooling apparatus that is adapted to cool an area is provided. The area may be populated by animals, such as poultry undergoing a loading operation. Further, since such loadings only occur occasionally for any given locale, the expense of a fixed cooling unit for each such locale would be prohibitive. As a result, the cooling apparatus needs to be mobile so that it can be moved and used during hot weather on the days it is needed.
For example, poultry loading operations often occur at remote poultry farms without sufficient facilities to provide adequate electricity or water for a permanent cooling apparatus of the capacity required. Consequently, a mobile cooling apparatus that is self-contained is highly desirable to insure timely operation and reliability. Since poultry farms have water available in quantities sufficient for watering purposes, the farm can often provide a portion of the water needed for the mobile cooling apparatus by using a simple garden hose to couple the system to the farm""s water distribution system.
While many vehicular configurations are possible for the present invention, in one exemplary embodiment, a van type trailer is adapted to be used as a mobile cooling trailer. The weight of such a trailer when all supplies and equipment are loaded will usually be in excess of thirty thousand pounds. In addition to weight requirements, the spatial dimension for the requisite length and height needed for formation and subsequent distribution of the suspended cooling air mist is large, especially when the area to be cooled is as large as a conventional flatbed trailer adapted to transport poultry. Such a width dimension permits a mixing chamber for advantageously mixing fine water droplets with an incoming air stream. This mixing allows for evaporative cooling of the air stream as well as ensuring that the mist and air are uniformly mixed and a desirable suspension formed prior to deployment onto the area to be cooled, especially when such is poultry loaded on a nearby trailer.
In the exemplary embodiment, a large (over 30 feet long) van or enclosed trailer is transformed into a mobile cooling apparatus by installing a battery of fans that blow air outwardly upon one side and installing a grid of misting nozzles on the other side and installing a water tank, an electric generator, a high-pressure water pump and necessary structural adaptations to accommodate these components.
At the beginning of a poultry loading operation, the cooling trailer is deployed proximate the transport trailer so that the transport trailer can easily be cooled thereby. A water supply hose between the farm""s water distribution system and the water storage tank on the mobile cooling trailer is connected and turned on.
The battery of fans pull air transversely through the mobile cooling trailer""s body to generate a cooling air stream with a suspension of water droplets. The grid of misting nozzles provides the water droplets or mist. The droplet size is such that the droplets are readily suspended in the air. The interior of the trailer body between the fan battery and the mixing nozzles defines a plenum that serves as a mixing and evaporating chamber. The air is first cooled evaporatively by partial evaporation of the misted water droplets. The excess water droplets are suspended and carried by the evaporatively cooled air stream to provide additional absorption of heat to the poultry on the transport trailer alongside.
The cooled air-mist suspension stream exits the mobile cooling trailer and it is forcefully directed upon the transport trailer with sufficient velocity to surround and penetrate it. This results in the advection of heat from within the transport trailer. This heat could arise from biological respiration of the poultry and the loading of hot cages, etc. onto the truck. There is sufficient air exchange to maintain the air surrounding and in contact with the transport trailer""s load at the temperature of the cooling air-mist stream. Additionally, part of the suspended mist will be deposited on the poultry and when this water evaporates cooling is accelerated. This fine water mist in the air is actually inhaled by the poultry and can absorb heat internally providing enhanced body-core cooling. Thus, poultry are rapidly cooled as they are loaded by being subjected to cool air, a moving air stream, small water droplets in respired air, and water being deposited on and vaporizing from their bodies.
An added benefit is obtained from the water deposited on the poultry when the transport trailer leaves the farm in route to the processing plant. This benefit is the cooling, especially when the transport trailer is initially traveling at low speeds, from the evaporation of the deposited water on the poultry bodies while they are enroute to the processing plant.
Thus, a principal object of the present invention is to provide a mobile cooling apparatus for cooling an area.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a mobile cooling apparatus that is substantially self-contained.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a mechanism for cooling animals such as poultry on the initial part of their journey from the farm to the processing plant.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a geometrical configuration that defines a plenum wherein water droplets are mixed with air and vaporized to both evaporatively cool the air and to form a cooling suspension therewith.
Another object of the present invention is to provide cooling of objects while they are being loaded upon a proximate transport conveyance by blowing a cooled stream having suspended water droplets onto the objects during the loading operations.
A further object of the present invention is to cool animals being loaded onto a transport trailer with a combination of cooled air, a moving air stream, small water droplets in respired air that can absorb heats of vaporization internally, and water being deposited on and vaporizing from their bodies.
Yet another more basic object of the present invention is to provide cooling in remote locales.
These and other objects and advantages of the present invention, along with features of novelty appurtenant thereto, will appear or become apparent in the course of the descriptive sections.